An editing device is provided which takes a video material and/or an audio material from plural sources such as a material tape, a video camera and a microphone, and edits these materials into a series of materials.
The editing device employs, for example, a method of installing plural VTRs for reproduction in parallel, reproducing materials, selecting necessary portions from these materials, and then sequentially connecting and recording the selected portions. Conventionally, the editing device employing such method has been broadly used.
On the other hand, another editing device referred to as a non-linear editing device system is provided. This nonlinear editing system enables recording and reproduction of materials on and from a randomly accessible recording medium like a hard disc as a temporary recording medium in editing, and thus enables non-sequential editing. Therefore, quick reading of a desired video material and insertion and deletion of a material with respect to a series of video materials may be carried out without having any inconvenience, thus improving operability of the editing work.
Meanwhile, recently, various video and/or audio-related devices such as a VTR and a video camera have been significantly diffused, and the demand for an editing device for editing materials has been increased accordingly.
In a number of cases, such editing device is used with various limitations put thereon, like the skill of an operator who operates the device.
To actually carry out editing using video materials, the non-linear editing system requires the operator to have predetermined technical knowledge concerning video editing. Therefore, the non-linear editing device has a problem that it is difficult to sufficiently exert functions thereof if the operator lacks the predetermined technical knowledge.
In view of the foregoing problem, it is an object of the present invention to provide an editing device, an editing system and an editing method which enable sufficient exertion of functions of the editing device and the editing system as described above even when various limitations such as the skill of the operator are imposed in actual editing work using video and/or audio materials.